


On A Lark

by Skairunner



Category: Parahumans Series - Wildbow
Genre: Asexual Character, Canon Compliant, F/F, Fluff, Musical Instruments, Slow Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-24
Updated: 2017-12-24
Packaged: 2019-02-19 16:45:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13127589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skairunner/pseuds/Skairunner
Summary: Lisa and Taylor trudge through the ruined, rotting Brockton Bay that Leviathan left behind. Lisa plays the violin for Taylor.





	On A Lark

It was the sort of day where the sky was a uniform grey—bright, but gloomy. The sort of day where the air was oppressively warm, full of moisture in a way that usually didn’t happen in Brockton Bay. It was all Leviathan’s fault, what with a good part of the city being under an inch of water. It wasn’t even that hot, but Lisa felt like she was sweating from every pore on her body. At least it wasn’t raining, she told herself, but it didn’t really help. She was _miserable_.

“You’ve said that about eleven times now,” Taylor said.

“What?”

“Complaining about the weather?”

“Oh.” Lisa blinked. “Doesn’t make it untrue.” Taylor didn’t say anything, but when Lisa looked at her she was smiling wryly, clearly suppressing a grin. Lisa sighed and splashed through the puddle stretching across the entire road. “I blame this _entirely_ on you.”

“I thought the puddles were shallow. My bugs can’t really tell how deep it is,” Taylor protested. “And anyways, this way is probably two, three miles shorter than going around.”

“Still your fault.”

“I’m not taking the blame for this.”

“Well, I’m giving you the blame. No refunds allowed.”

“That’s not how it works.”

“Tough. I don’t make the rules.”

“Besides,” Taylor said, “you were the one who wanted to walk. We could’ve asked Rachel to give us a ride.”

Lisa frowned to herself. Taylor did have a point there—Lisa _had_ suggested they walk back from Taylor’s place to her’s. There were two reasons for that. One, she didn’t enjoy riding Bitch’s dogs, though they were undoubtedly useful ways of getting around. Also it would mean having to wear a costume, and that just wasn’t happening in this weather. The second reason, though… She glanced at Taylor, who was looking down at her feet, carefully treading through another muddy puddle.

It was a bit of a contrast to how she’d been during the Leviathan fight, unaware of her own surroundings but _knowing_ how the fight as a whole was going—now, she was so focused on what was right in front of her. Oblivious. Though, going by her absent look of concentration, she was definitely concentrating on her power, something further away from here. Lisa looked around, but she couldn’t easily spot any out-of-place bugs. Taylor hadn’t commented on how she had fallen silent. As per usual. Lisa wasn’t sure whether she should be thankful that she’d been spared the embarrassment, or annoyed that Taylor didn’t notice. Though it also seemed likely that the girl had just considered that thread of conversation to be over.

“We could’ve,” Lisa finally said.

“What?”

“We could’ve asked Rachel for a ride, yeah. But I didn’t want to.”

“Why not?”

Lisa went with something inoffensive. “Wanted to keep it low-key.”

Taylor snorted. “I guess her dogs are a little obvious.”

“Yeah, I’d rather not blow my civilian ID. It’s useful.” Lisa squinted at the distance. The daylight scattered across the entire sky thanks to the cloud cover, so shading her eyes wouldn’t really help. This had been a residential area, kinda suburb-y while still being in city limits, and that meant there were a lot of half-collapsed houses, rubble in the streets, and the detritus of what had once been perfectly usable everyday objects heaped on top of said rubble. Comparing the surroundings to the map she’d briefly checked before heading out, they were about halfway through the supposed shortcut. They probably ought to have turned back ages ago, but in for a penny and all that. Sunk costs. Hell of a drug.

Something caught her eye among all the trash, a blue blotch that her power helpfully identified as an instrument case. Violin, maybe an ⅞ scale viola?

When they walked closer, she could see that it was a violin case, in particular. It brought memories back. Well, mostly memories of absolutely hating her instructor with every fiber of her being, especially the ones that composed her fingertips. It’ll be better once she formed calluses, he’d said. Hah. She’d gotten calluses, all right, and taken lessons for years, and what was it good for? Nothing. Just another extracurricular to add to a list of extracurriculars that she never even used because she ran away from home.

Lisa found herself climbing the small mound of dirt and bricks and splintered furniture. The case was made of hard plastic, and even without opening it she could tell it probably had a lot of padding inside. Obviously it couldn’t have been a Stradi-level expensive violin—otherwise the owner would’ve treated it like their own life—but it was better than a department store instrument. She crouched next to it and confidently reached for the zippers she knew existed.

“What’s that?” Taylor asked.

Lisa answered her question by hinging the case open. A pale violin made of wood lighter than the varnish was nestled inside, with a cloth draped over the strings. She lifted it away. The bridge of the instrument was wedged in an obviously wrong position, and she noticed concentric wet-marks like a topology map all over the poor instrument. There were a couple divots in the front panel near the fingerboard, too. Yet another casualty of the Endbringer, which was too bad. It could’ve been pretty. She was reminded of her own violin, which had been a color much like this.

“Huh,” was all Taylor said.

“Used to play,” Lisa said, lifting the violin up. It didn’t fall apart, which was good. She nudged the bridge back into place. “I haven’t touched one since, you know. Stuff.”

“Stuff…? Oh.” Lisa saw Taylor shift awkwardly in her peripheral vision. “Well. How long did you play?”

“Something like two, three years? I had a nice violin, but I _hated_ the lessons.”

“I had a flute, too,” Taylor said. “I didn’t know how to play it very well.”

Her voice was soft and wistful. Lisa could tell that it was something to do with someone she loved. Taylor didn’t have siblings, so it was probably her parents. Mom? She resisted the urge to prod, though, because Taylor would probably shut down on her. “Well, playing an instrument is overrated. All it gets you are calluses that stay forever. And some meaningless awards, I guess.”

Taylor smiled a little. “Can you play something?”

“I could,” Lisa said slowly.

“But?”

“Not my fault if you hate it.”

“I promise I won’t.”

Lisa eyed Taylor in mock suspicion. “If you say so.” She unhooked the bow from the lid and ran her finger along it. It was still a little damp, probably as good as totally ruined from a professional perspective, but it wasn’t like it was _her_ instrument. And she wasn’t doing a recital. She put the violin down and rubbed the block of resin on the synthetic hairs of the bow. It wasn’t ideal, because the water had washed away the typical coating, but was anything? Lisa felt Taylor’s eyes on her.

“Don’t you need sheet music?”

“Nope, I have like a dozen pieces memorized. Last time I checked.” Sufficiently practiced music became muscle memory, and you didn’t forget how to ride a bike just because you hadn’t ridden one for years.

“Really?”

“Really. My tutor made me.” Lisa straightened, violin back in her hands and a cloth on her shoulder. “Some bullshit about how you can’t make real music without memorizing it first.” A ghost of a smile flitted over Taylor’s face. Lisa grinned back at her, mostly to hide her hesitancy. What if she screwed up? It’d really been forever. She gripped the instrument with her chin and placed her fingers on the neck. She quickly tuned the thing—the G string was fine, but A and E were very off—and touched her way through the opening bars of the song she wanted to play. She could easily tell she was out of practice. “I’m almost ready, I think.”

She glanced at Taylor again, who looked positively excited, for Taylor. It was her crossed arms and the slight head tilt she had when she was focusing on something. Lisa fiddled with her grip on the bow. No matter what she did, it felt off. Maybe the thing was broken after all, entirely disregarding what her power told her.

“Is something wrong?” Taylor said.

Lisa pursed her lips. “No, nothing is wrong. I’m... I’m getting there.” She set her bow on the E string, slightly less than a third of the way down, took a breath, then stroked up.

She’d’ve liked to say she played like a virtuoso, but in actuality it felt like she was barely managing to make it music and not noise. Moving her fingers up the neck into third position to hit the high notes didn’t feel as natural anymore, and she kept having to correct her notes halfway through. She could feel herself sweating in a way entirely divorced from the heat. She stumbled her way through the first few bars of the song.

Lisa spared a look in Taylor’s direction. She was appreciative but not impressed. That wouldn’t do. Lisa could fix that. She opened up her power slightly more. When she was keeping it suppressed, all it provided was little nudges, hints here and there. Just like her old tutor. But with it, she could pretend that she actually hit her positions. She could almost hear the difference in how confident she was. She swayed a little, leaning into the melody, trying out more daring, dramatic vibrato.

Okay, maybe it was a little bit fun.

She dipped into the low notes before slashing her bow across D to E, jumping an octave and dancing near the bottom of the fingerboard. Her violin sang higher than she could ever, resonated with something in her, fell and rose again. She could actually feel it vibrating between her chin and her shoulder, so strong that she was afraid the violin would give up and fall apart. Like it wanted to fly away. This song was made for a triplet of piano, cello and violin but it was just her and the violin’s E string. There was no accompaniment, but she made do.

Lisa wished she had score, though. Then she would have something to stare at. She couldn’t help but look for Taylor’s reaction, and her power told her everything she didn’t want to know. The taller girl was nodding her head along with the stronger notes, but she also had the tiniest of winces every time Lisa landed a note wrong. Maybe she was overreacting, and Taylor didn’t think it was bad at all. She probably couldn’t even tell, to be honest—but that was its own pressure, that Taylor was enjoying it. More and more Lisa wanted to _win_ , somehow, except she couldn’t throw some carefully calculated barbs at the violin so it would crack, stop playing wrong notes and sing like a canary. No, the only way to win at playing the violin was practice, and Lisa was about good as bankrupt on that.

Relax, she told herself. It’ll be worse the more she tensed up.

The violin creaked ominously, as if to punctuate that statement. It wasn’t going to fall apart, at least. And as far as she could tell she was definitely not choking the fingerboard at all. Lisa wanted to glance at Taylor again but she had to weave her bow all over the strings for the last few notes, high to low to high again, so she couldn’t.

“I liked that,” Taylor said as the last note faded away.

“Thanks.” Lisa paused, then looked away from Taylor. She liked it, and she wasn’t saying it just to be polite! She couldn’t keep her face entirely straight so she glanced at the sky instead. She didn’t really know how to tell time by finding the sun, especially through the cloud cover, but she figured it was three. “We should get going, maybe.”

“Maybe,” Taylor said. She considered Lisa. “Are you going to keep it?”

Lisa looked at the violin and the bow in her hands. “Well,” she said. “It’s falling apart.”

“Keep it til it does. Or fix it.”

“I don’t know how to fix a violin. What if it can’t be fixed?” The thing was barely holding together, with how wet it’d gotten during the days after the Leviathan attack. The glue holding the panels together was probably brittle, and the varnish had been damaged. The bow was starting to warp. Really, as a bow-violin collective it was on its last legs. When she’d tuned it she could feel how stiff the pegs were, swollen as they were from the water, and the moment the mold started growing would be its death knell. Take a look at the clock, note the time of passing. It wouldn’t last a week.

“I think you want it,” Taylor said.

Lisa frowned at Taylor. “I’ve been coming up with reasons _not_ to keep it.”

“Yes, so you do want to.” Taylor gave her a stern look that said she thought Lisa was being silly.

“I…” Lisa faltered. It felt like losing to admit that she wanted it. Actually, it _was_ losing. Losing the argument. That wouldn’t do. Her position was weak, but she could still salvage it. She rallied herself.

“You could play me some more stuff, maybe?” Taylor added, expression softening. “I’d like to hear.”

“Um. Okay. For you, then.”

“Though, Lisa?” Taylor grinned a little. “If the other guys do complain, I’ll say it’s _all_ your fault.”

Lisa never stood a chance.

**Author's Note:**

> Think _Last Carnival,_ Norihiro Tsuru. Thanks to BeaconHill, frustratedFreeboota, profHoyden, tearlessNevermore for looking it over. BeaconHill gets a dark green block of resin. As Cauldron’s resident tmthesaurus helped a _lot_ in improving this short story. Her _curriculum vitae_ includes _Éclair de Lune_ and _Time After Time_ , both of which are very gay :v


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